Hi All, I attempted a Manco clone tonight and was quite pleased with the results!

I've been playing around for a while with different formulations, not always aiming for a Manco clone. This week I tried this:

2 TS IDY4 TS salt2 cups water2 cups KA AP flour PLUS more4 TB oil

I'm sorry that I don't have exact weights for flour, but I wanted to post anyway. I mixed the IDY, water and 2 cups of flour and let it sit for 30 min. then added enough additional flour to make soft sticky dough, then added oil (then had to add more flour cause dough got really too sticky.

I did a bulk room temp rise for about 2 hours, then scaled and balled into 4 balls and let sit for 2 days in fridge. I took them out only 1/2 hour before cooking and dough was still quite cold. I stretch the dough SUPER thin, thinner than I ever have before. then baked at full blast with the Weber grill set up shown (preheated about 15 min).

I topped with white extra sharp cheddar followed by pizza sauce (high quality imported tomato puree with basil and added salt, pepper, touch of crushed red pepper, sugar, garlic powder and oregano; all to taste). Cooked for 4 minutes. Hope to clone again soon and post more photos if anyone is interested.

I found that technique - getting dough super thin and doing the bulk warm rise followed by cold rise was almost as important as the ingredients.

Hi All, I attempted a Manco clone tonight and was quite pleased with the results!

I've been playing around for a while with different formulations, not always aiming for a Manco clone. This week I tried this:

2 TS IDY4 TS salt2 cups water2 cups KA AP flour PLUS more4 TB oil

I'm sorry that I don't have exact weights for flour, but I wanted to post anyway. I mixed the IDY, water and 2 cups of flour and let it sit for 30 min. then added enough additional flour to make soft sticky dough, then added oil (then had to add more flour cause dough got really too sticky.

I did a bulk room temp rise for about 2 hours, then scaled and balled into 4 balls and let sit for 2 days in fridge. I took them out only 1/2 hour before cooking and dough was still quite cold. I stretch the dough SUPER thin, thinner than I ever have before. then baked at full blast with the Weber grill set up shown (preheated about 15 min).

I topped with white extra sharp cheddar followed by pizza sauce (high quality imported tomato puree with basil and added salt, pepper, touch of crushed red pepper, sugar, garlic powder and oregano; all to taste). Cooked for 4 minutes. Hope to clone again soon and post more photos if anyone is interested.

I found that technique - getting dough super thin and doing the bulk warm rise followed by cold rise was almost as important as the ingredients.

eiram21,

Thank you very much for posting about your Manco clone doughs and pictures of your pizzas. Thanks also for posting your recipe and work flow in case someone else might want to try it. I am glad you could stretch your dough very thin. I can see you are learning a lot about dough and that is really good! I sure would be interested in seeing your methods and pictures of your future Manco clone pizzas. You pizzas looks a lot like Manco and Manco. Great job! Very interesting that you got such good results on your Weber grill.

My oldest daughter and friends went to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware and Ocean City, Maryland today. She is going to try and purchase me some cheese that some Grotto’s sell. She is also going to purchase me a few slices of Grotto's pizza to try when she gets home. I know Grotto’s pizza are different, but they still have the spiral sauce applied. I can’t ever remember tasting a Grotto’s pizza before.

2 cups of flour and 2 cups of water??? That would make a batter, not a dough. That can't possibly be a formula you used to make pizza dough, that's just WAY TO WET!

Dave,

This is what Marie posted.

I mixed the IDY, water and 2 cups of flour and let it sit for 30 min. then added enough additional flour to make soft sticky dough, then added oil (then had to add more flour cause dough got really too sticky.

I don't know how much additional flour Marie used. I guess she just went by how the dough felt, which is something that different members here do.

Hi Everyone, Yes - sorry to cause such confusion!! That is why I used the caps as Peter observed. What stinks is that I usually cook by feel and taste and I have trouble documenting the recipe. I did use MUCH more flour than 2 cups!!! I plan to try my recipe again soon and will document more.

The whole point though was that I feel technique counts just as much as ingredients in producing the final dough. I made another pie with the same exact dough and it came out very different. Cooked maybe a minute longer and the dough was not stretched as much...with the Manco like pie, I really really pushed the limits when stretching it and even thought I was going to end up with a cracker crust...but I didn't!

Here is the other pie made with the same dough but with mozz and sauce put on in the more traditional manner.

Hi Everyone, Yes - sorry to cause such confusion!! That is why I used the caps as Peter observed. What stinks is that I usually cook by feel and taste and I have trouble documenting the recipe. I did use MUCH more flour than 2 cups!!! I plan to try my recipe again soon and will document more.

The whole point though was that I feel technique counts just as much as ingredients in producing the final dough. I made another pie with the same exact dough and it came out very different. Cooked maybe a minute longer and the dough was not stretched as much...with the Manco like pie, I really really pushed the limits when stretching it and even thought I was going to end up with a cracker crust...but I didn't!

Here is the other pie made with the same dough but with mozz and sauce put on in the more traditional manner.

Marie,

I really don’t think you created a lot of confusion. Different pizza makers on this forum do go by feel and don’t use baker’s percents. The only problems with not using baker’s percents is if someone wants to try out that recipe they might have a hard time duplicating the same results, or if you want to change only one variable it might be hard to decide if why you got different results if it was from how much flour you added or from the mix time, bake time, or something else.

Technique does count and if you get to know the feel of your dough and watch how it reacts you can make successful pizzas. Different TF factors also matter, because the pie might not also bake in the same amount of time, as you saw. I believe in experimenting to learn more about dough and see you are doing that.

Thanks for posting the picture of your other Manco attempt with stretching the dough thinner and baking a little longer.

My daughter did purchase two slices of Grotto’s pizza in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware for me to try and brought the slices home last evening. She stopped at two Grotto’s and neither of them sell any of their cheese. It is a good thing she couldn’t purchase any of Grotto’s cheese because it doesn’t taste like Mack’s or Manco and Manco. The tomato sauce on Grotto’s slices is also a lot sweeter than Mack’s or Manco and Manco. I liked how evenly browned the bottom crust was on the Grotto’s slices. Even though the sauce is also applied in a spiral pattern, the taste of the whole pizza is nothing like Mack’s or Manco and Manco. I am posting about Grotto’s pizza because it also is a boardwalk pizza and I have always wondered what a slice of Grotto’s pizza tasted like. Grotto’s slices did reheat well. I thought the rim crust had a little sweet taste, at least in my opinion. My daughter told an employee at Grotto’s that she wanted the two slices to take home and not to reheat them, but she said they did put them though some kind of quick conveyor oven. I thought that was interesting because I didn’t know that did that for a reheat.

Since I tried a blend of AMPI mild cheddar at Reply 59 http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,9068.msg96257.html#msg96257 and a blend of mozzarellas, and since found out Joey Mack uses AMPI shredded mild white cheddar cheese on his pizzas, I purchased a block of AMPI mild white cheddar to try alone on my next attempt for a Mack’s pizza which might be next week if I find the time.

If the cheese doesn't give you quite the "twang" you're looking for, Norma, try letting it sit out for a day before using it on the next pizza.

Pete,

Welcome to the forum! Do you have a pizza business that you know what happens if I let the cheese sit out for day? If I would let my regular cheeses sit out they would become quite gooey. I know from taking cheese out of the deli case if some extra pieces of cheese are in a Cambro container before I wash the container.

I also have problems with Nasonville cheese if I grate it the day before and even put it in the deli case. It wants to clump together in a day.

I know cheeses that are aged to develop more flavor, but would a day sitting out give any cheddar cheese that twang? Did you ever try AMPI mild white cheddar on a pizza and have you ever eaten a Mack’s pizza? I know the cheese at Mack's sits out, at least some in high heat. Sorry to be asking all the questions, but I am curious.

Welcome to the forum! Do you have a pizza business that you know what happens if I let the cheese sit out for day? If I would let my regular cheeses sit out they would become quite gooey. I know from taking cheese out of the deli case if some extra pieces of cheese are in a Cambro container before I wash the container.

I also have problems with Nasonville cheese if I grate it the day before and even put it in the deli case. It wants to clump together in a day.

I know cheeses that are aged to develop more flavor, but would a day sitting out give any cheddar cheese that twang? Did you ever try AMPI mild white cheddar on a pizza and have you ever eaten a Mack’s pizza? I know the cheese at Mack's sits out, at least some in high heat. Sorry to be asking all the questions, but I am curious.

Thanks for your help!

Norma

Thanks, Norma!!! I've been following this thread for quite some time and it was actually my impetus to come out of the shadows and join the site. LOL

Actually, I'm a huge Papa Dino's fan as it was the first pizza I ever ate in my life and enjoy both the Mack's and Grotto's boardwalk types as well. Back in the '90's, I ran into a guy on a landscape job in an over-55 community who said he was the former owner of the now-defunct Nancy Lou's Bar-B-Q in Palmyra, PA and the subject of Papa Dino's pizza somehow came up. He told me they used a mix of mild cheddar, mozzarella, and provolone but they let the blocks sit out for a day before grating and refrigerating it for use on their pizzas. Of course, I never verified this with any of the Groff family members who own/owned the Papa Dino's chain since I figured this was proprietary information but I thought it might be something you could use in your quest.

Right now, I'm using DelGrosso New York-Style sauce and straight whole milk mozzarella on my homemade "smokey grill" pizzas and as I get settled in here on the site, I'll post more about some of my mad pizza scientist experiments as well.